


But for a Simple, Brown Collar

by Eva



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Collars, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-11
Updated: 2012-05-11
Packaged: 2017-11-05 03:58:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/402205
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eva/pseuds/Eva
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The one where Mycroft wears a collar.  FINISHED.</p>
            </blockquote>





	But for a Simple, Brown Collar

**Author's Note:**

  * For [watin77](https://archiveofourown.org/users/watin77/gifts).



*********

It was a simple ring of rich brown leather, with a brassy buckle that gleamed under his Adam’s apple.  Greg swallowed and looked down at his hands, tried not to clench them into fists when Mycroft absently hooked his own finger through the loop and tugged.

“Is this bothering you?” Mycroft asked quietly.

It shouldn’t.  He’d seen stranger things in his life, certainly, than a man wearing a dog collar—but this was Mycroft Holmes, in a dark blue suit, tie loose and top button undone, with a collar around his neck and a glass of wine in one hand, unwinding in the low lamplight of his own personal study.  Greg was the intruder here, dry-mouthed and jumpy, electric awareness skating along his nerves, as he tried to remember why he’d come in the first place.

“It is,” Mycroft sighed, answering his own question, and moved to undo the buckle.  Greg almost stood, moving forward with an almost violent speed, before he checked himself.

“No,” he said quickly, and felt the blush spread over his face with an almost painful heat.  He met Mycroft’s cool, steady gaze and then looked at the floor, licking his lips but feeling as if it hadn’t helped.  “I just.  I’m—”

“Distracted,” Mycroft breathed, and Greg’s eyes were irresistibly drawn to his throat, to the long, elegant fingers fidgeting with the loop where a leash would connect—

“Fuck,” he whispered quietly, with strong feeling, and squirmed in his chair.  At the top of his peripheral vision, he saw Mycroft smile.

*********

It fucking haunted him. Greg would be sitting in his office, working on some ridiculous bit of paperwork, or wandering around the shop, trying to remember if he still had eggs, when the memory of Mycroft Holmes in a collar would hit with all the force of a hammer.

He’d actually dropped the eggs in Tesco.

He was at home, well, at his flat, the grungy little post-divorce flat he’d meant to move out of at first opportunity more than a year ago, fighting with a lightbulb when someone knocked politely.

“Fuck,” he muttered, and grudgingly hopped down from the small step stool. “I’ll be back for you,” he promised, pointing at the stubborn light, and went to pull the door open.

Of course it was Mycroft Holmes. Greg had known it would be, because it would have to be, even as he pulled the door open, but by then it was too late to just hide behind the sofa.

“Can I help you?” he asked, incredibly aware of his t-shirt and jeans, of his stubble and his unruly hair, and even more so of Mycroft’s blue suit--the same goddamned suit he’d been wearing a week ago. The shirt and tie were different, and he hated himself for having committed the image so clearly to memory that he knew that.

“I’m to apologise,” Mycroft said, staring at him hard, as if it were Greg’s fault he was standing there. Greg backed away under the force of that stare, which was his mistake: Mycroft took it for invitation and stepped into the flat, closing the door carefully behind him.

Greg backed up a few steps more and crossed his arms over his chest. “Whatever it is, it’s fine,” he said, aware of how defensive he sounded, but fuck if he was able to do anything about it. “It’s--it’s fine. All right?”

“You haven’t been answering Sherlock’s texts,” Mycroft said, looking down at his umbrella, and Greg couldn’t keep himself from grimacing.

He hadn’t been. He hadn’t wanted to deal with anything having to do with Holmeses, and of course Sherlock would figure something was up, but he rather thought Sherlock might’ve come to him first. Christ. 

“He told me to apologise for whatever it is I’d done,” Mycroft added. His face was tilted down, looking at the umbrella he was idly twisting with both hands, but he looked up at Greg through his eyelashes, shadowed and long in the dim entryway. “I’m sorry.”

“I said it’s fine,” Greg snapped, and fled to the kitchen. There was a toolbox underneath the sink, and he sat down on the floor to pull it out and go through it, looking for the pliers.

Mycroft’s steps were slow and deliberate, and Greg gripped the toolbox with both hands, staring hard at the jumble of nails and screws in the top-right compartment, feeling like every thud was vibrating in his spine.

“I confess,” he said, his voice soft but incredibly loud in Greg’s ears, “that I left it on to see your reaction.”

“Oh yeah?” Greg managed, though his throat seemed to want to close. He could just see the long, straight line of Mycroft’s leg to his right, in his peripheral vision. His shoes were brown leather. Greg swallowed hard.

“It was rude of me, and I do sincerely apologise.”

Greg sucked in a breath and held it; he couldn’t make himself look away from that shoe, and his entire right side was tingling, itching for some kind of contact, even a brush of fabric along the hairs sticking up on his arm.

“Why?” he blurted out, and shut his eyes tight. He hadn’t meant to ask it.

“Why?” Mycroft repeated, drawing the word out just a bit, softening it, making it his own. The wave of heat that rolled over Greg at the sound of it made his hands clench tight, the toolbox rattle. He barely heard it.

“Why do you wear it?”

The silence stretched tight between them, bright and surreal, and Greg schooled himself to keep from shuddering when Mycroft spoke.

His voice was cool. “That’s not something I owe you.” He walked to the door and Greg felt as if his lungs could expand again, and he took a quick gulp of a breath.

“But.”

Greg looked up. Mycroft was standing in the doorway to the kitchen, half-turned, one elegant hand curled under his chin, over his throat.

“If you’d really like to know, you can ask me tonight.” His eyes flashed a warning that made Greg’s entire body tense. “Eight o’clock, in my study.”

Then he left, closing the front door behind him with a gentle thud, and Greg collapsed against the cabinet to his left, breathing hard and covering his face with one shaky hand.

Fuck. Fuck.

*********

There was no real choice. Greg dithered until six thirty, but he knew he would go. 

He showered, a quick, cold rinse and a shave, and didn’t meet his eyes in the mirror. He could see how flushed his face was; he didn’t need to see anything else.

The black suit, the nicest one he had, and a white shirt--the best he could do. He wouldn’t show up in jeans. He had some pride, and anyway, it might help his confidence a bit, even though he would never compare to Mycroft. The grey and blue tie would work.

His hands were steady as he tied it, and he risked a glance at his face in the mirror. The feverish intensity of his gaze made him wince.

Right. He couldn’t even convince himself he wasn’t begging for it.

“You don’t want to do this,” he told himself, the lie falling flat and desperate.

He took a cab. Fuck if he was going to drive himself; he would probably end up wrapped around a street sign. And he wouldn’t be taking a cab home. Mycroft could spare a car for a kidnapping here and there; he could damn well spare one for a--what, date? Appointment? Greg snorted and tried to ignore the prickling heat dancing over every nerve-ending in his skin.

Mycroft’s house was guarded by a gate with a keypad lock, and again by a separate security system with another keypad lock at the door. As he got out of the cab, his phone buzzed with text: both codes, sent by Mycroft himself, as had been done each and every time he visited.

It felt more personal this time, and Greg jabbed the keys almost viciously. 

The garden, the shadowed corridor; by the time Greg made it to the study, the whole night had taken on a strong tinge of the surreal. And the man in the leather chair, black trousers and crisp white shirt, cuffs and top two buttons undone, and no other item of clothing at all but for a simple, brown collar...

“Fuck,” he whispered. It was very nearly a whimper.

Mycroft’s gaze flickered over him and Greg almost flinched at the feel of it, fever-bright. “Thank you for joining me,” he said mildly, and stood. “Can I get you something?”

“Scotch,” Greg said roughly, and stomped to the chair opposite the one Mycroft had been sitting in. Rather, he started to; Mycroft moved to stand in his way and Greg lifted his chin, jutting out his jaw. 

“Are you angry?” he asked, though there was no curiosity in his tone. He sounded polite, and almost bored.

“Why?” Greg asked, his voice almost steady. He kept his hands clenched tightly in his jacket pockets. 

Mycroft tilted his head, and then stepped gracefully past him, to the small drinks cabinet. Greg sank gratefully into the chair and tried to control his breathing. Mycroft handed him a glass a moment later, and then took a glass of red wine with him to the opposite chair, eyelashes lowered as he seemed to contemplate Greg’s shoes.

“I find it comfortable,” he said finally, and met Greg’s eyes with a calm strength. One hand sneaked up to fidget at the loop again, and Greg’s stomach tightened. “Comforting, perhaps. Something that’s not part of the uniform--” he flashed a mirthless smile-- “but is, nevertheless, close, and binding. A reminder.” He tugged on it, index finger yanking down on the loop, and the heat in Greg’s skin sunk in deep, lovely and pooling in his belly.

“Reminder of what?” Greg asked, too low, too throaty. He hadn’t meant it. He coughed and shifted, but Mycroft’s eyes were staring meaningfully now at his mouth, and Greg took a hurried swallow of his scotch when he realised that he’d been biting his lower lip.

“Of my ever-present duty, of course,” Mycroft said, and stretched his arm out long to put his wine on the desk. Greg took another drink, and almost choked when Mycroft stood, sliding out of the chair with all the grace of a dancer. “Even on my own time, I must maintain control.”

Greg let the glass be taken from his nerveless fingers, and stood, shakily, when Mycroft pulled him up by his wrist. His heart was beating so loudly in his ears he almost didn’t hear Mycroft say, “You can.”

“What?” He licked his lips, bit down on the lower one again when Mycroft directed his hand to the collar. Mycroft’s head tilted back; Greg traced the supple curve of it, ‘round from the side to the buckle and then the loop.

“Yes,” Mycroft said again, responding to another question Greg hadn’t been able to ask, and Greg hooked his own finger around the loop, and tugged. Mycroft gasped, a quiet, tiny, ecstatic sound, and Greg tugged again, stepping into it, their bodies brushing with terrible, beautiful, electric heat.

Mycroft caught his wrist and Greg froze, though he couldn’t stop panting. “Let me kiss you,” he said roughly, as Mycroft’s grip tightened and he lowered his head, met Greg’s stare with bright, wild eyes.

“Take it off,” Mycroft said breathlessly, and that was right, because if they were going to kiss, then this wouldn’t be between them. Not the first time. Greg whimpered helplessly as he tried to undo the buckle, his hands hopelessly clumsy and slow. But he got it undone, pulled it free, and Mycroft’s mouth was on his, hot and wet and demanding, and he was down on the desk with the collar still clutched in his hand.

Mycroft pushed away abruptly, starting to stand, and Greg hooked a leg around Mycroft’s and begged, “No, please.” He caught Mycroft’s sleeve with his free hand.

“This--” Mycroft looked almost confused, if that wasn’t entirely laughable. “I didn’t--”

“I’m not saying you have to shag me,” Greg said, sliding his hand down to grab Mycroft’s wrist, “but you damn well cannot leave me like this on your desk, Mycroft Holmes.”

Mycroft’s gaze softened, and he pressed his hand down over Greg’s erection, making Greg curse and buck up under his palm, head banging back on the desk hard enough to hurt, if he’d been able to notice.

“No, I can’t leave you like this,” Mycroft murmured, and pressed against him again, sliding his palm up the front of Greg’s trousers. “Nor do I want to.”

*********

Greg undressed, feeling Mycroft’s stare like a physical thing, like heat or a weight on his skin. He shivered under it, the hairs on his arms standing up stiff and straight.

Mycroft was naked already, and when Greg turned to face him, his chin high and challenging, Mycroft had already lowered his own, leaning back against the door in an open, vulnerable position, looking down and to the side. The collar was dark against the pale, smooth skin of his throat.

Vulnerable. It wasn’t the performance, but rather the lie that had Greg swallowing hard, trying in some way to disguise his very physical reaction. Mycroft was anything but vulnerable. He was anything but biddable, even wearing a fucking collar, even looking at Greg now from under his eyelashes, hands lax against the dark wood of the door.

When Greg finally walked over to him, standing in front of him with his arms held unnaturally stiff at his sides, Mycroft sighed—a deep, cleansing sigh; a sigh that shook Greg to his bones. Then Mycroft carefully took Greg’s right hand and lifted it to his throat, to the collar.

Greg’s fingers curled around the buckle without conscious decision and he pulled Mycroft to him, kissing him desperately, hungrily, and acutely aware that they were touching each other nowhere but at their mouths. Mycroft had dropped his hand as soon as Greg had yanked. Fucking ridiculous, and intolerable—Greg put his left hand to Mycroft’s face and was pulled into a full embrace, heat and slick, velvety skin all along his body as Mycroft’s arm closed around him.

Every time one of them pulled back to catch a breath—even if it was Greg himself—Greg yanked on the buckle, helplessly, bucking his hips and trying to get ever closer. Mycroft stroked over his back, down to his ass, cupping each cheek and pulling him into a rhythm that exactly matched each yank on the collar. Greg whined, high and desperate, and pulled harder.  
Mycroft managed to escape the kiss for a moment and whisper into Greg’s ear, “Next time, leash?” and that was it, Greg was coming hard and seeing nothing, nothing at all but the image of Mycroft on his knees, the leash connecting to that bright, shiny buckle.

*********

**Author's Note:**

> watin77 asked for collars, and this is what happened.


End file.
